Blue Eskimo aligns services to LPI Capability Map
Blue Eskimo, specialist learning and training recruitment provider, is aligning its services with the Learning & Performance Institute’s Capability Map.
Leading learning recruitment company Blue Eskimo is aligning its approach to recruitment with the Learning & Performance Institute’s Capability Map. The Capability Map was launched last year by the Institute as a free-to-use tool for learning professionals. It enables people to create their own skills profile, using a common language.
Since its launch, the LPI Capability Map has been used by over 1,400 learning professionals. The tool is the result of around a year’s work and provides a skills framework for learning professionals which is divided into nine categories, each containing twenty-seven skills – with four competency levels per skill.
Nick Jones, director at Blue Eskimo, believes that the LPI Capability Map’s ‘common language’ provides both an effective way for learning professionals to present their skills and an efficient means for organisations to assess people when recruiting.
Says Jones, “There are inherent limits to a CV – which is typically a brief overview of a working life. CVs don’t use a common language and tend not to focus on current skills in a way that can easily be compared with those of other people.”
Blue Eskimo believes that, by integrating the LPI Capability Map into its recruitment process, it can make it easier for candidates to apply for roles, and easier for organisations to assess those candidates.
“We see the Capability Map as a learning professional’s essential companion document to the CV. But where the CV leaves room for self-expression, the Capability Map delivers a more objective picture of someone’s capabilities. We’re now encouraging all candidates to supply both a CV and a download of their competency profile. We’re also working with employers, to help them use the Capability Map as a recruiting and skills-profiling tool.”
The Capability Map is a Web-based tool that is free to use. Results are stored securely, can be updated easily – and people can download a formatted competency profile at any time.
“The adoption of the Capability Map is growing,” says Jones. “Over time, we expect that those candidates who choose not to supply a capability map will, as a result, be disadvantaged in the selection process – so we’d encourage all learning professionals to use the free tool as soon as possible; not just when job hunting either, but to keep an up-to-date record of their skills profile.”
Edmund Monk, Managing Director, The Learning and Performance Institute commented: “The Learning and Performance Institute (LPI) exists to continuously raise standards of professionalism within the learning community, whilst promoting and measuring the impact of learning on organisational performance. The Institute recognises that workplace learning is changing and with it the skill set required to be a successful Learning Professional. In October 2012, we launched the LPI Capability Map, a free online self-assessment tool designed to support people at all levels of their L&D career. It is the product of a year’s work examining the current literature and practice in conjunction with a range of leading industry experts.
In the past five months Learning Professionals have used the Capability Map to carry out over 10,000 self-assessments. An analysis of this data clearly shows that whilst there is a great deal of expertise in the traditional skills of classroom delivery, content design and managing the learning function, the same cannot be said of what we would regard as ‘new’ skills such as collaborative learning, data interpretation and business intelligence.
We are delighted that Blue Eskimo are aligning their recruitment process with the LPI Capability Map and would encourage all Learning Professionals to use the self-assessment tool to identify their strengths and also become more aware of the skills they will need to meet the new challenges faced by Learning and Development.”